Chamber Blog
~ May 2015

Last week, top executives and business groups from Canada, the United States, Europe and Japan met in Berlin, Germany at the B7 Summit. Canada’s delegation was lead by Monique Leroux, President and CEO of Desjardins Group. While at the Summit, the B7 issued a joint statement calling for G7 leaders to take action on key global challenges, including climate change and trade.

As host of next month’s G7 Summit in Schloss Elmau, the German government had asked for the B7’s input on its proposed agenda. Business leaders met with Chancellor Angela Merkel as well as the German Finance Minister, the Foreign Minister and the President of the Bundestag. During these meetings, the B7 highlighted the importance of achieving an ambitious outcome at the United Nations climate conference in Paris this fall as well as national measures to improve energy and resource efficiency.

Yesterday’s announcement by the federal government that it intends to allow Canadians to voluntarily make additional contributions to the Canada Pension Plan (CPP) promises good news for Canadians and their employers. The Canadian Chamber has long supported providing employers and employees with retirement savings options that recognize their varying resources and needs without imposing additional burdens – in the form of higher payroll taxes – on businesses.

This morning at an event on Parliament Hill, we launched our national elections platform,A Canada that Wins. This document provides the political parties with a list of priorities the business community wants its next government to address. Chief among these concerns is making Canada more competitive.

By presenting this document early in the pre-campaign stage, we are setting the stage for collaboration with candidates and parliamentarians in crafting forward-thinking, long-term public policies that foster a globally competitive business sector. In order to concentrate our efforts, we have applied a laser-like focus on competitiveness and have grouped public policy priorities into the four factors that are critical to business competitiveness:

As a very active advocate of improvements to the Canada/U.S. border relations and programs, we have made this one of our top issues. So it was no surprise that we were invited to discuss progress with government officials as they released their most recent update on their Beyond the Border initiative.

It was surprising that the Prime Minister himself joined Trade Minister Ed Fast to participate in the discussion. As our Senior Vice President Warren Everson said, “no other Prime Minster in our experience has been willing to dig into the complex details that are so important to ordinary people trying to do business across that border.”

Every other week, we release 5 Minutes for Business, a publication written by Hendrik Brakel, our Senior Director of Economic, Financial and Tax Policy. In these publications, Hendrik briefly describes current issues that affect the Canadian economy and provides insight on what it will mean for Canadians today and the future. In this week’s edition, he looks at how our loonie is performing.

This 11th edition of the Canadian Chamber of Commerce’s International Trade Day, Canada Meets the New Pacific, was a perfect venue for the business community, elected officials and government representatives to discuss the upcoming challenges and opportunities associated with Canada’s trade activities in the Pacific region. Canada has become much more economically active in the Pacific region recently, but there is still room to grow in these markets, according to the panellists and speakers.

Her Excellency Petronila P. Garcia, Ambassador of the Philippines to Canada, opened the day while the Hon. Ed Fast, Minister of International Trade, gave the opening keynote address. The Hon. Christian Paradis, Minister of International Development took part in an armchair discussion with the Hon. Perrin Beatty, President and CEO of the Canadian Chamber of Commerce, Stewart Beck, President and CEO of the Asia Pacific Foundation of Canada, and Benoit Daignault, President and CEO of Export Development Canada.

Every other Tuesday, we release 5 Minutes for Business, a publication written by Hendrik Brakel, our Senior Director of Economic, Financial and Tax Policy. In these publications, Hendrik briefly describes current issues that affect the Canadian economy and provides insight on what it will mean for Canadians today and the future. This report looks at how important it is for a government to balance the national budget.

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